Alison of Kalispell

In the distance
a large flower
became a white hat
became an old woman
shirt open to the wind

We talked the loop
we, and her friends, would make
But my eighty-year old heart
and lungs have climbed enough
today (never worrying a button,
a shift for the wind to close her tight)
I plan to eat lunch, sit
then there’s time
to go back, pull the food together

For an hour
an anchor
as we climbed, into, out of, cover
With each step smaller
she grew
more complete
in my aspirations

Somewhere
must be
children, who chide
mom, at least take a grandson
or two, to be safe,
her friends on the mountain
anticipating a
triumphant return
crowned with fat soup
and pie,
a long love who held
her there in the place
she sat
touching the simplified air

We found, then passed
two women
two more
then three, who found us again
to share a pass
and revelations

Alison, then you saw her
good
she’s ok.
and heading back soon to start
your dinner.

Three versions – the smile women wear
when they tell
a secret about a friend
a secret she knows they know
and doesn’t care if they tell

Wonder what that will be
no tellin
We should never have assigned
her dinner–
her dinners, on a long hike day,
we’ll have something to pitch after all
Do we still have brownies
and Pam’s coffee cake?
Good lord
all that sugar,
we’ll be at it all night

The yogurt is scraped
crackers around
and I reshuffle
expectations

A long way for eighty–
opening an invitation
she’s from here, has kids here?

No kids, says she never wanted them
even after he left her, at 55
she’s still bitter about that though

And it slides across
three sets of teeth
three chins
up into six laughing eyes —
the callus but not cruel joy
you find in fellow survivors
after the rescue tally is closed

Faced with a stretch
of snow dissolving within its own
requirements, they turn
We estimate probabilities
and toe in
each step a precipice,
its own ledge into disaster
And still we climb
internal rhythms racing
through this obstacle
to the so little more forgiving
rock.
not noticing
until we turn,
the perspective change